China’s PR challenge?

Chinese Companies Going Global- Ogilvydo.com


From these earlier events, we have seen marked growth in interest in PR from Chinese companies pursuing growth in international markets. Amid the investment banking, accounting and legal advisors they are turning to are PR professionals.

Today, rarely do we meet aspiring global Chinese brands that are inflexible and insistent on what they want to say to whom. On the contrary, they are asking,‘what is important?’‘How do we gain understanding from the foreign country’s consumer?’
The predominant nature of these global brands is not political. They operate in auto ecosystem areas, traditional Chinese medicine and medical equipment. They want to expand beyond Chinese borders but are novices in doing so.

They want to buck the cheap‘Made in China’ trend. They know that what they say is not as good as what others may say about them. So they are coming to PR to communicate in an authentic way.

We are working with a client now in such a way. They are non-political. Their ambition is to acquire a company in the US that has leading technology in an area where China does not. They want to buy the company to bring the technology to China to upgrade its ability to operate similarly. This technology can help save lives. Their plan is to understand all of the company’s stakeholders to let them know their true ambition. They want to understand who they are, what matters to them and how to bridge the gap in understanding. They want to know how to make such a partnership a success.

This company wants to communicate in an authentic way. It wants to get to know the citizens, the politicians, the employees and rather than communicate what it wants to say, it wants to understand what is meaningful to them and find out how it fits into this mix. Certainly, it has a business mission, to acquire the technology, but it realises this will not be successful if the stakeholders are not happy.
Fortunately, it is beginning to think like campaign strategists. In an era when campaigns are won and lost, we are certain this Chinese global brand will succeed.